And Whither Wilt Thou Go?
by TheOldWildHeffernan
Summary: And just like that, it was all over. Everett, Pete, and Delmar are free, safe, and almost respectable. So what now? Well– (A rambling, overwrought, ongoing sequel.)
1. Chapter 1: Nobody Knows But Me

"I never did figure him for a _paterfamilias_," Delmar remarked, from the shadow of the shade tree on which he leaned. Pete was slouched on a bench beside him.

"Yeah," said Pete.

"Never woulda thought he'd like little children enough to have so many."

"You don't have to like 'em to have 'em."

"Maybe." They both tracked, like history's slowest and most distant tennis match, the family McGill as it wove toward the railroad crossing. The daylight washed them out of sight before the turn did. They lived beyond, out toward the edge of town, in a pale green house with peeling paint and two screen porches. It smelled of Fels-Naptha and dirty laundry. You could hardly see the neighbors through the trees, and it was quieter inside and out than one might expect. The children were quieter, perhaps, than one might expect, given their parentage, and the wind in the aspens noisier.

"They quarreling?" asked Delmar.

"They ain't ever _through_ quarreling."

"But they ain't really meant it too hard lately though. Not since the flood."

"_Since the flood_–since this morning?"

"Hardly seem like this morning."

"Any case, when it come to them...I don't know. That woman's mighty contradictory and Everett can't keep hisself shut-up to save his life."

Delmar blinked at him in an overheated kind of way.

"So they'se always gonna have something to disagree on," Pete elaborated.

"Mm." Delmar tried to unfocus his eyes and blur the shimmering pavement, but succeeded only in rolling sweat into them. "Suppose they like it that way." Pete shrugged peevishly.

"Don't make no sense to me," he muttered.

"Why, _Pete_."

"What?"

"You're partial to a good contradicting yourself, Pete." After a moment he added, "No shame in that."

"Not in front of the kids, I ain't."

"Mm." They sweat in silence for twelve seconds before Delmar took in a loud, troubling breath. It set Pete's teeth on edge.

"Pete!" Delmar gasped. "You don't mean to tell me you're a _paterfamilias, _yourself?"

"I am _not_! No, all I'm saying is I was him I wouldn't..." Pete rolled his eyes. "How in Hell would I have got to be a _pat...paterfam–"_

"_Paterfamilias_! I mean there's… I do believe there's only one way, Pete."

"I know that, Delmar. I mean with my being away all this time. I hain't had the chance."

Delmar shook his head sympathetically.

"Oh, that is a shame. It'd be awful nice to have the chance."

"The chance…" Pete leaned back and tried to remember the last time he'd been at even the slightest risk of parenthood. It wasn't too satisfying, whether or not you counted all that with the sirens. Delmar said something under his breath that might have had to do with toads. "It's over with now," said Pete at length. "But my." His voice bottomed out; his eyes burnt and Delmar wanted to clear his throat, and maybe leave. "_My_ was they fine."

"I… well," he said instead. "Uh. You don't wanna be father to no siren."

"Fathering weren't hardly the object, Delmar."

The two of them could hardly move to speak. Delmar would just as soon have been sitting down, but the effort to shift seemed unthinkable. Pete was thirsty. Six hours before, they'd been, by either of their reckonings, done for, but a lot had gone on since then. Truly, it had been awful, in the original sense of the word.

Who knows where Tommy went. Home, Pete guessed. Interesting to consider, that Tommy had a home_. _Maybe a mother waiting for him there. Tommy seemed much too smooth to have a mother. But he was, what, twenty? Twenty-five? Of course he would. His people had kids young. Pete's mother had been plenty young enough (fifteen and eight months), but she was a Hogwallop and could hardly help but go wrong somehow. Pete's mother was dead and Delmar's mother–or maybe it was his stepmother–lived in Meridian with his sister–or maybe it was his half-sister–and said she didn't want to see him again now he'd brought criminal notoriety on their name, so they planned to stay on one of Everett's porches for now.

It was strange to be seen but not noticed. It was strange to see color in clothing, and women and children. It was strange for nothing to be _happening. _No time was ticking. Pete had been suspended, to some degree, between rage and tedium for nearly fourteen years. Now he was just… bored.

It was nice.

He wasn't sure how long it would stay nice for. But he had forty, maybe fifty years to figure that out, if he ate right, and a day–or even a week–sweating on the Ithaca Memorial Bandstand Common wouldn't hurt him. Delmar, Pete imagined, was never bored. Pete had known him a while, and felt like he'd always known him, and he'd never even seen him tap his foot except to music. Pete figured peace–not boredom, just a perfect state of low excitement–to Delmar, was a hayloft. Not _doing_ anything in the hayloft, just the hayloft. An udder or two to break up the day. Pete wondered if Delmar spent time around too many udders early in life, and gotten turned off of breasts altogether. Surely something had gone wrong. Pete tried to relax his shoulders.

"Suppose it was Everett's object?" Delmar spoke up again at length. Pete considered going into some depth, but it was too hot.

"Naw," he finally said.

Delmar nodded.

"So he was a passionate lover." Pete squinted.

"What in the name a' sweet Mary Magdalene is it to you?"

"I was just thinking."

"Maybe you oughtta not. Law in Heaven." Delmar looked sheepish, but not half as much as he looked sun-stroked. He shrugged.

"I weren't trying to call no judgement on his character, now. I don't see as it matters what he got 'em by… whether 'twas passion or purpose-like, or fornicating, even, allowed he does right by 'em. I just hope he likes 'em, is all. Why, I'm sure he likes 'em just fine, now he's got 'em...I just never woulda figured it."

"Ain't our business, nohow." Pete rolled his eyes and started cracking his knuckles. He'd been knocked clear out of contentment, and would resent it until he regained stagnancy. Delmar mopped his brow on his sleeve and squinted some more. "A man's kin is his own business," Pete reiterated.

"Sure, Pete."

"What a man does with his kids is his own business."

"Sure." Delmar looked vaguely determined. "You know, I never meant to speak ill or nothing." Pete waved a hand in acknowledgement, but did not pause.

"Like I says, a man's kids is his own business. Everybody's got a different idea on how best to prove up a child. You know, schooling n' pocket money, how they dresses, which end of the belt to use. Still. Shouldn't truss up them gals like that." Pete flared his eyes like he had an itch in them. "Makes me sick."

"What for?"

"It's like the goddamn chain gang. They can't get free of one another."

"Oh, sure they can. Them big gals has just got a hand on it, anyhow, and even them little things could surely…_gnaw_ their way lose. In a pinch."

"Don't matter. It's the symbol of it."

"Oh?"

"See, they ain't chained down or nothing. Not in iron, leastways. But Everett's old lady's got 'em trained up to stay like in line like that, just... _followin_g along any which way they's drug without… oh, without knowing where they'se headed, with no say at all about it. How'd she like it, huh? Just puts a damn bee in my britches." Pete glared and bounced a knee. Delmar gave a forbearing smile, which seemed awfully inconsiderate, but his eyes were sort of glassy, and Pete suspected he'd stopped listening.

"Mama?"

"Mm-hm?"

"How did Daddy live getting hit with that train?" Penny grinned a Mona Lisa and kept her eyes on the cutting board.

"Well, honey, it turns out Daddy wasn't hit as hard as Mama was led to believe."

"Didn't he get squashed?"

"No. Mama must've misheard the train police." Penny, who'd been taking practice swings in the meantime, finally went to work on the potato before her. It didn't last long.

"So…" Alvinelle puzzled, mouth open. "Where'd he go, then?"

"It still hit him _pretty_ hard, baby. He was in the hospital. And he couldn't write or call, on account his jaw and both his hands got broken." Alvinelle leaned thoughtfully into Penny's skirt.

"I'm sure glad he's home now," she said. "And his jaws and hands is better."

"Of course you are, honey."

"I sure missed him."

"Of course you did, honey."

"Mr. Pete and Mr. Delmar get hit by a train, too?"

"I believe so."

"Was their hands broken?"

"Maybe. It's very rude to ask, so I ain't and I expect you won't, neither."

"Why?"

"It's rude, Alvinelle, that's why."

"But why's it rude?"

"It hurts a lot to get hit by a train." Penny sliced the last potato in her pile. "And it's sure gonna hurt if I hear you been asking folks questions about them, or your Daddy, either." Penny bent and kissed her on the forehead. "They'd like to put it behind them. You understand?"

"...Okay."

"Okay?"

"Yes, ma'am." Penny stuck the knife into the cutting board.

"Run and get mama another couple taters."


	2. Chapter 2: Little Bessie

Tommy was tired and well-fed. Laid out in the dark, across the same quilt he'd teethed on, he was as close to cool as it was possible to be.

It wasn't that he couldn't get to sleep, but that it kept going wrong once he did. First he felt face-down, hands and nose in shallow water–not drowning, but tense and dreadful, like he'd just been pushed–it was someplace gray and cold, with dark, smooth stones, somewhere he had never been–then he rolled onto his back, and tried to find something good to think about, something dry. But before he could, he was underwater, in the dark. It was silent and he realized, in horror, that he was breathing, but could not move. He had hardly blinked _that_ away when he felt himself drop suddenly–

Tommy lifted his head and took some deep breaths. Eventually his heartbeat slowed, and he was just plain tired again. He was gripped by an instinct he had not had in many years; to cover himself completely, to pull himself far enough beneath the covers nothing could reach him. It was more comforting, as thoughts go, than he would have expected.

Tommy thought about the devil. He kept his eyes peeled 'til he was thinking about the quilt again, and then he was asleep.

"So she really doesn't know?"

"No sir, she don't know _nothin'_!"

"No sir," repeated Alvinelle. She was a guest in June and Maureen's bed. The three of them, plus Lyssie, sat Indian-style in conference beneath the sheet.

"Ain't it tragic?" June flew a hand to her chest.

"Gee," said Lyssie. She thought for a moment, grave as ever. She was the oldest by what must have been a very serious eleven months. She and June were both ten until the first of August. "Guess that means they never told her when they sent him up to the penal farm. The police or the judge or whomever."

"Or they _did,_ and she was so devastated she couldn't bear remembering," posited June.

"Yeah," breathed Maureen. Alvinelle nodded, mouth and eyes both wide.

"It makes sense," said Lyssie, slowly. "You can't hardly blame her, though."

"Lord, no! Imagine hearin' _your_ husband'd been in some kinda train wreck, then soon as seems he _might_ could live, _bam! _He's throwed in _prison_. And you're all alone in the world–"

"With seven hungry mouths to feed–"

"Six, Starla weren't born yet."

"–six hungry mouths to feed. That'll get you to the end a' your tether in no time flat."

"Ain't like she went crazy, though," said Lyssie.

"Not _really_, just the slightest bit," said Maureen. "Like how Fibber McGee forgets when Molly ain't around!"

"'Cause he miss her so dear."

"So he says goodnight to her anyhow!"

"Sure he's foolish, but that's love, right there. And they _is _married. In real life."

"I wonder if we shouldn't say something, though." Lyssie bit her lip. "Might be less of a shock coming from us."

"No!" shrieked Maureen.

"_Shh!_" June leaned in. "Lyssie, don't you tell her! It'll break her heart!"

"We _can't_ break her _heart_!" Alvinelle glanced guttedly between them all.

Lyssie nodded solemnly. "It's true."

"We gotta be strong for _her_."

"It's our duty."

"It's tough, but we gotta!"

"Yeah." Lyssie considered it all for another second. She enjoyed the idea more each second. "Alvinelle, you don't say a word to Xanthe and Patty, got that? We gotta protect them, too."

"From the hard truth."

"Mm-hm."

The sound of footsteps sent them scrambling, Alvinelle back nextdoor and Lyssie back into her cave. The bedsprings were squealing when the door opened, but the girls themselves were sprawled like battlefield dead, and breathing slow.

This time Pete and Delmar shared the bench. Pete had given up on reading the paper and Delmar had found a pocket knife somewhere to chip at a corn cob with.

"We oughta get us some clothes," said Pete. "Some nice pre-sennibal clothes that's clean. That ain't all scruffed-up and..." Pete eyed Delmar critically. His shoulder-seams hung halfway to the elbow. His trousers practically fit but Pete was reasonably sure Gramps had died in them. "Some clothes as fit. And match." Pete was the same size as Wash, so he'd landed what Wash wouldn't wear. Wash wasn't picky. "Look at us. Folks is gonna think we're bums."

"You think so?" said Delmar. He craned his neck. There was a loafer on every bench that didn't have two loafers, in more and less correct states of dress and consciousness than they. There were a lot of benches. Delmar had paid them no mind. Personally, he was better groomed than he'd been since roughly 1934. Everett invested in a fine razor, for a man's ablution might well be his absolution. At least that's what Everett said. Pete, for once, vehemently agreed. He was even cleaner than Delmar. Once his hair grew in he'd look practically regular. Delmar figured they'd impress FDR himself, if he should happen to roll by. He figured FDR was a pretty bright guy, and he'd tell Pete not to worry about lost opportunity and middle age and other things he couldn't change, and Pete couldn't be surly about it then, because it was the president. Delmar was not the president.

"I think we look purty good!" Delmar did say, though.

Pete shrugged. Delmar nodded, satisfied he'd made his point, and went back to his whittling; however, another thought occurred to him, and he paused to let it solidify.

"Say," he said at length. "If we're to be the best men, we gotta look...right, don't we?"

"Yes, we do," said Pete, trying his best to sound like he'd already had that in mind.

"So… what're we gonna do?" Delmar thought for a second and shook his head glumly. "You know I been banished from Woolworths."

"You need _money_ if you wanna shop at Woolsworths."

"...Right."

"And we ain't got none a' that even if we _is_ pardoned and brain-trusted."

"Guess so." Delmar shook his head again. "An' we cain't go lifting things offa folks's lines in case we gets ourselves un-pardoned."

"Hm."

"The Bible says you cain't steal, anyhow."

"I thought that was in the Cumanments."

"I thought those was part of the Bible."

"I don't think so." Delmar tossed his corncob towards a distant storm drain. It fell neatly through. That perked him up a little. He gave Pete his undivided attention. "No, definitely not," Pete went on. "They'se just scratched into some kinda tombstone. I seen a picture on it."

"Well that's my mistake, then."


	3. Chapter 3: The Man That Comes Around

"Where'd you run across them fancy new arraignments, boys?" Everett asked. He had flapjacks in front of him, Patty-Rose on his lap, coffee in one hand, and the newspaper in the other. His hair might as well have been lacquered vinyl, but Everett didn't have the kind of face you could ruin with too much hair product. The older girls had gone out to play and Penny had left for her mother's, to retrieve her wedding dress–she hadn't promised the wedding would go through, but she wanted to be prepared for a miracle.

Pete had on a crisp gray shirt on that Everett had certainly never seen, but approved of, on Pete, at least. His suspenders might have been new, too–they also might have been Everett's, but before Everett could get a closer look, he heard a screech from the porch. Starla was awake. Everett's heart leapt to his throat–not in alarm–well, not entirely in alarm. He could not get enough of his girls these days. He was greedy for them, with all their ribbons and shouts and scents. He'd been watching them sleep. Everett _loved_ Penny. It was a love that had as much to do with his sense of his Rights as a Husband and his Allure as a Fine Piece of Man as it had to do with Penny. He married her for love–of her–and pride–of her, and even Everett knew (at least a third of the time) that pride was his downfall. It was also Penny's downfall, and he strove in general to be an object of her pride, not an opponent. They certainly never wanted for passion. So it wasn't an un-generous love.

But Everett had forgotten what it was to hold his daughters in his arms and love them without condition, for their own sake. They were just so goddamn _sweet_. Their games, their voices–

Starla howled again, and Everett's hackles rose. Maybe not their voices. It was enough they were cute; he didn't have to kid himself.

He looked frantically from hand to hand.

"Want me to fetch in the baby, Everett?" asked Delmar. He'd taken a large bite at Everett's question–he could guess well-enough what an arraignment was–but he was through it now.

"Uh," said Everett, as he managed to find a spot for his coffee on the kitchen table. "That shouldn't be…" He tugged experimentally at Patty-Rose. She glared and wrapped her arms around his neck. She wasn't much of a talker yet, but she could make herself heard. It helped that she was heavy. "Well, see...sure, just be careful. Two hands." Delmar rumbled back from the table and strode, not remotely offended, out. He had on new overalls_. _Well, new to him. Everett felt that overalls stood outside the realm of fashion entirely, and accordingly that the individual merits of pair could not be evaluated by any standard of, say, pants. He did wonder if any overalls were a good choice for a man of Delmar's stature. He'd be a rude surprise if anyone mistook him for a boy from behind.

"So what about them clothes, Pete?" Everett asked again, as the screen door clapped shut.

"See, Delmar and me was drivin'." Pete was a nervous liar.

"Mm-hm?" Everett was drinking his coffee rapturously, eyes closed. Pete flared his eyes at the syrup dish.

"We was drivin' up to Canton, to...see about sendin' a letter…"

"And there was some folks on the road had been foreclosed on. Whole little family of 'em. We offered 'em a lift, but turns out they _got_ a truck, just got too much to fit on it. They was tryin' to sell some, but we only had money for the stamp. They said we oughta take some stuff anyway, since they was only leaving it," said Delmar. "Terrible thing." The screen banged shut behind him as he concluded his flood of verbosity. Starla was sipping air on his hip, trying to decide whether she'd gotten what she wanted.

"Yeah. Terrible," muttered Pete.

"Shame. Lucky for you boys, though." Everett snapped his paper open. "There's a post office in Ithaca, you know."

"Huh! Guess we shoulda asked," said Delmar thoughtfully.

"Yeah! Practically kitty-corner. Always next time, though." Pete shook his head darkly and went back to his flapjacks.

"Everett?"

"Mm?"

"What do you like I should do with the baby?"

"The–?"

"Starla?"

"Dammit, I know her name. Set her in the high chair, there, I'll find that bottle in just a moment."

"S'in the icebox," said Pete. "Middle shelf, beside the deli meat."

"There ain't no deli meat."  
"It was next to it when there was." Pete paused. "'Bout four o'clock this mornin'."

"Pete, are you slinkin' around _my_ house, at four a-goddamn-m, pilferin' my deli meat?"

"It was just the couple slices balony. I'll owe ya."

"These is hard times we're in, Pete."

"It was some hard balony." Everett rolled his eyes and rose, finally having found a place to set down his coffee. Patty-Rose had a pretty good grip, so he had a hand free.

"Some houseguests you are. Usin' up the soap, usin' up the charcuterie, usin' up the sun porch. If you weren't such charmers you'd be out on the curb, I'll tell ya that much. Small wonder I'm goin' gray–the average American man, you know what he has to contend with? 3.76 persons per household, that's what, in conjunction with hisself. And we turn our gaze to us and ours, and see here we got us a man, a divorcée, si–seven little gals, three cats and two superannuated hayseeds, in five rooms an' a privy. We're turning this fine abode into our own cozy little fire hazard. I only have myself to blame, of course. Why–if you don't like anybody underfoot, why, you better quit makin' love and friends, and why bother–"

"Everett?"

"–toiling on, that's what I say, if you ain't makin' one or the other–or money. Anyhow, just lemme–"

"Everett, she's sleeping." Everett turned from the stove, bottle in hand and pan in the other. Delmar was whispering, and he was right.

"Oh. Well, that's alright. Don't wake her, then, just–"

"I could put her back out–"

"–put her back out on the por–Jesus, Delmar! Don't move her. She's bound to be up in a minute, just… hold her 'til I finish this, she's bound to be squawlin' again by then. Babies!" Everett grinned wildly and went back to heating up the bottle. "Just noddin' off apropos nothing, like narcoleptic banshees. Ain't that right, little lady?" he said, doubling his chin to address the toddler draped, like an iron cuff, around his neck. Patty-Rose would have fallen onto the stovetop if she'd fallen asleep right then, and gave no affirmation.

"Ain't it something, though," said Delmar. "They'll drop off right into their supper if you let 'em. Or down on the floor, or..."

"I ought to know, Delmar, I've had six, ain't I?" Delmar sat down carefully. Starla slumped against his chest. It didn't look very comfortable to him, but obviously she didn't mind. Still, he eased her horizontal, and studied her. Her veins were pink in her eyelids and blue in her temples. She was warm and damp, not yet grown out of her birdliness. She seemed awfully bendy, damp and new, but couldn't be younger than, what...Delmar couldn't count and hold important objects at the same time.

"She's awful long, ain't she?" he said. She wasn't particularly, but it was something to say about a baby.

"Sure she is! They're all slender. Graceful. Lithe. Chip off the ol' block. Well. All that's really more thanks to Penny."

"Got yo' eyes, though," said Pete, between bites.

Everett beamed, taken unawares.

"You think so? I figured that, myself, but then, I think they all take after me one way or another."

"Don't know I'd go that far."

"You know if you blow smoke in a baby's ear it'll stop 'em fretting?" said Delmar.

"That's nothing but an old wives' tale, Delmar." Everett swung Patty-Rose onto his back like a satchel, disencumbering himself to warm the milk. "Just wait 'til you got some gals a' your own, they'll teach you a thing or two about fretting. Right, darlin'?" Patty nodded.

"Oh, of course I ain't a father or nothin'. Got brothers n' sisters, though."

"I thought they was older."

"Those is different ones."

"Shoot, how many a' you are there?"

"Depends how you count, I guess."

"Depends on what?"

"Well, time was we had a round dozen, but properly speaking some's full and some're halves or steps, or...Lee died o'er in France...an' Hollis, well…he ain't dead, but he's a sorta...funny and nobody'd heard from him some time when I was sent up." Delmar stared at Starla another few seconds. "Suppose he _might_ be dead."

"Oh, I'm sure he'll turn up," said Everett. "You never know when some kinsman or another's liable to drop out a' the blue an'–" Everett was cut off by a knock at the door. "Dammit," he muttered. Pete stood without a word and made his way to the hall.

Stepping over a different child–she had a name Pete had never heard of and lay stretched across the passage, busily eating a crayon–Pete opened the door.


	4. Chapter 4: Born About 6,000 Years Ago

Pete didn't say anything, or do anything in particular, but apparently he didn't have to.

"Howdy!" exclaimed the stranger, and thrust out a plump, pink hand to match his plump, pink smile.

"Uh," said Pete.

"Pleased to find you at home!"

"I'm not, uh...if you're looking for Ulysses McGill, I ain't him." Pete took the hand reluctantly. It was soft enough to feel unclean. "If you tell me your business I can fetch him for you, though." The stranger shook his head, still smiling.

"Oh, it hardly matters who I speak to. May I come in?"

"That all depends. What do you want?"

"Why, I'd like to come inside and explain to you!"

"You kin explain just as well right here." Pete didn't move. This man made him bristle. He wore a linen suit and a straw hat and sweat like cheese left in the sun. He smelled of body odor and talcum powder. His grin did not shrink, though it grew stiff around the edges.

"There's really no call for this sorta alarm, sir. My business is entirely legitimate, rest assured. It's simply outta concern for your privacy that I wonder… if you might not prefer–"

"I ain't concerned for my privacy," said Pete stonily. He realized as he did this was not, in fact, true. "That is–"

"Well, Pete, who is it?" called Everett.

"Someone as won't say!" replied Pete, without breaking eye-contact.

"You ask him?"

"_Yeah_, I ast him, I ain't thick!"

"As a matter of fact, I don't believe we'd come around to the matter of innerductions," said the stranger, as cheerfully as ever. Pete didn't appreciate that. "Astor Roth, of the Ridgeland Daily Telegraph. Pleased to make your acquaintance…?"

"Pete," said Pete.

"Pete," said Astor Roth. He paused for a moment. "You're a musician." Pete wasn't sure. He said nothing. "Founding member of the Soggy Bottom Boys, smash hit and perennial mystery?"

"Maybe."

"Do you have a minute to talk? Folks are just dying to know the men behind the music, you know." Pete didn't answer.

"Everett?" he shouted instead.

"Yeah?"

"It's some kinda newspaper-man! Wants to know if we'se musicians!" Before Pete had finished speaking, Everett was pushing him aside.

"Hello and good mornin' to ya, neighbor. Ulysses Everett McGill. It's a pleasure. You're a reporter, I hear? A journalist?"

"That's exactly right. Astor Roth's the name. I'm with the Ridgeland Daily Telegraph. Straight from the shining city to your front door, wondering if any a' you gennelman would grant me a innerview. Half the country knows your song by now and all a' Mississippi heard you live with the governor on Friday, but that's about the most anybody knows about it. But let me be the first to tell you…" leaned in conspiratorially. "They'd sure like to know more. As long as you're willing, that is–I'd hate to impose."

"We'd be more than willing, Mr. Roth. We'd be delighted!" Everett swept Pete, and the door, to the side and beamed. "Lemme show you through here and we can get started straight away." Mr. Roth looked relieved around the eyes and cadaverous around the mouth.

"...May I come in, then?" he asked after a beat. At least Everett was better than the reporter, Pete thought with a rush of approval, at grinning all-the-way-up, but even Everett hesitated.

"Why, you have my express invitation!" he exclaimed warmly, all the same. Mr. Roth nodded graciously and stepped over the threshold.

"Gals," Everett announced, "We've got company! Xanthe, say good morning to Mr. Roth." He set her on her feet in passing, and pocketing her crayon. She looked mutely between them all. Her chin crumpled. "There's a good girl." Everett kissed her exuberantly and tossed the crayon upstairs. Xanthe scampered after it on all fours.

"You've already met Pete–this here's another associate of ours, Delmar O'Donnell. Delmar, Mr. Roth. We're gettin' interviewed for the paper."

"The paper?"

"The Ridgeland Daily Telegraph," said Mr. Roth.

"Oh, okay."

"Pete, why don't you fetch that pitcher a' Mrs. McGill's tea outta the icebox and–"

"...Mrs. McGill?"

"_Yes, _Delmar. I'll bring the glasses–go ahead and set the baby down."

"Mighty fine tea," said Mr. Roth. He was settled blissfully in Penny's mother's aunt's wicker slider, spats on the settee and a glass in hand fairly glittering with sugar.

"You bet! Can't beat it. Now, Mr. Roth, I don't mean to presume, but what sort of a feature did you have in mind? You lookin' for biographical details? We'd be happy to expound on recent experience more specifically, if you'd prefer, of course." The boys sat hip to hip in Penny's mother's aunt's wicker loveseat, Pete to the right and Everett to the left and Delmar in the middle. Other arrangements made their skin crawl. They were all models of good posture.

"Biographical!" Mr. Roth mused, smiling cherubically. "What a fine idea."

"Stellar! Well, I was born, one fine April day, all the way up in Danville. Mother and Dad had moved often. See, my father was a renowned, though widely unrecognized, sensation of the dramatic stage. Mother–"

"Thought your old man was in Vaudeville," said Pete.

"That's what I said. That was after he'd been a preacher–before my time. Made our way coast to coast four times by rail 'fore he landed a job here in Ithaca. Schoolteacher, grades six n' seven. As I meant to say, Mother was a piano teacher. Guess you could say that's where I got my start, musically. What about you, Delmar? Where'd you learn to sing?"

"I...don't rightly know." Delmar glanced around and smiled at Mr. Roth. Mr. Roth smiled back.

"Say!" said Everett brightly, after a long pause. "Your Momma played the five-string, didn't she?"

"Sure...I done too, a little. Since I been 'round...thirteen, I should think."

"You musta sung then."

"Shouldn't think it'd be the _first_ time I done, though..."

"It's close enough. Certainly vital to your, uh, musical development. Pete here knows a thing or two, as well, from the time of his youth, that has influenced us terrifically as a group." Pete looked panicked. "Ain't that right, Pete!"

"Uh–"

"Picks a fine guitar, and a fine tenor to boot. When you start out, Pete?"

"I learned the guitar in...the last, uh, last few years. Ain't much good, though. It's Tommy as plays on the record."

"Tommy Johnson!" Delmar reiterated.

"Yessir, that's Tommy Johnson, young fella up North a' here a bit, finest bluesman ever picked steel. Didn't happen to've joined us for breakfast this morning, else you could hear him in the flesh. And that's all the boys, right there."

"And _I'm_ from Bayou la Batre," said Pete. He gave Everett a dark glance. "Born January twelve 19-3. Delmar's from up Sunflower County way." Delmar nodded helpfully. "I forget his birthday."

"Third August."

"Oh, yeah."

"Anyhow, we been singing together, oh...a year?"

"'Bout a year."

"How'd you three happen to meet?"

"Well. Uh. Pete here–"

"We was on the chain gang together," said Delmar. "Pete and myself knowed each other some time before Everett was sent up." Astor Roth looked eager.

"Everett?"

"That's Everett," Delmar said, pointing at Everett.

"That there's my middle name, Mr. Roth, rolls off the tongue a mite easier in pleasant conversation than Ulysses, you know. That was my mother's maiden name, you see–a fine appellation for a fine lady–"

"So it's true," said Astor Roth. "Y'all really did escape off the farm."

Pete grit his teeth. Everett sighed through his.

"Technically yes, sir," he said. "But as you may have gathered from the radio feature, we've all three been pardoned by the governor hisself."

"Oh, certainly, certainly, it's all behind you now."

"That's right."

"And Tommy weren't never in jail to begin with," said Delmar.

"After all, I can see clear enough just talking to you gennelmen it wasn't any heinous crime landed y'all up in iron fetters." Everett scoffed and shook his head.

"Why, Mr. Roth...the very idea's just three feet short of an insult. No, we're all set to settle down, maybe cut a few more records, find a little peace in this world. Oh, that reminds me, Mr. Roth, me an' my wife, well, since I made it back whole we figured on reaffirming our vows, so-to-speak, this coming Saturday, and I'd be delighted to extend an invitation to you and any other members of the press."

"Oh my God," said Pete.

"Thank you kindly, Mr. McGill. Why, it'd be my pleasure–no offense, then, I'm sure?"

"Of course not, Mr. Roth, of course not. We've got nothin' to hide, have we, boys?" Delmar nodded. Pete didn't move. Astor Roth smiled for a long time, so still the room got eerie, and then got abruptly to his feet.

"I thank you gennelmen very kindly for inviting me in. I shan't intrude any longer. Best of luck in all y'all's endeavors. I'm looking forward to sending this feature out your way, I can only pray it does y'all justice–" He was hurrying, all the while, towards the door. Bewildered, Everett, Pete, and Delmar followed suit.

When they made it out to the porch, there was no sign of him.

It was a noisy morning, riotous, in a green and insect way. They blinked.

"I sure hope we was a help to him," said Delmar.

"I sure hope he was a help to us," said Everett.

"I sure hope he don't try to help us no more," said Pete.

The hounddog was back.

Tommy thought he'd seen it at the edge of the woods when he went out to draw water before breakfast, but really he'd only been sure of movement. Now it snuffled back and forth, with its baleful eyes, with its eyelids like they'd turned inside-out and melted, just on the line where the grass met the trodden dust before the steps. The steps where he sat. His guitar was on his knee, but he felt too cold to play it. The laundry lines fluttered, and the bottles chimed together on Jackie Gordon's tree. They made the air itself sound fragile.

"Why don't you leave me be?" Tommy said at length. Whatever breeze was sounding off those bottles wasn't reaching him. The hounddog moaned and cocked its head. "You heard me." His hands were heavy.

But when he finally got them to jump to, they played on their own accord. Something dense and loud and jubilant. Tommy's mind was a blank. He heard it all, but he didn't particularly consider it. The dog didn't bolt. It paced. It still had its leash.

"Git," said Tommy, but he couldn't hear himself.

This was new. He didn't know the song. He watched his hands from some great distance. He couldn't feel his tongue.

"Git!" he yelled. "Git, you mean ol–oh, gaw." Tommy wrinkled his nose, and muted the strings. The dog was gagging, loud as a horse, if a horse had a gag reflex. Once, twice, before it vomited a fantastic quantity of what looked like mud.

"As if you weren't foul enough," said Tommy, but it was already gone.


	5. Chapter 5: The White Rose

"The home of my birth," said Everett to the lake. "My very cradle. All blown to bits in the name of hydroelectrics. You call that progress?" The lake lapped grayly back at him. It still swam with silt and debris.

"Well, I can't disagree, really. We all gotta make sacrifices. Why, that's just the truth, in' it. The goddamn truth." Everett ran his hands over his hair and, without warning, roared as he kicked a healthy clod of mud off into the water. He did it again, and when he couldn't find another suitable chunk, he kicked a piece of tree-limb. He half-crossed his eyes in pain, and once he'd hopped in a circle, cussing, for another few seconds he sighed and acknowledged–re-acknowledged–that no human eye (let alone hand) would ever find that ring again.

"Lord have mercy," he said darkly. As phrases go, it didn't really pack the punch he'd been reaching for, but he was starting to exhaust himself. He'd been there since noon.

He would have to buy another one. He felt the wind go out of him. That was all he could do; he'd have to prove in cash how much he wanted her, if he couldn't prove it muckraking.

"I couldn't even afford the last one!" he exclaimed incredulously. "And it was back in god-damned-twenty-mother-scratchin'-six!"

Everett was wiry, then. He didn't have a hair of gray on his head, and he was a bailiff. Imagine. A bailiff. Well, in the morning he was a bailiff. In the afternoon he went door-to-door selling toilet water and compact mirrors, and at night he either peddled moonshine–he was never a runner, just a sales representative–or tomcatted around Ithaca, as much as one can tomcat in a town of 862 when there is a prohibition on alcohol, gambling, and business on Sundays. Mostly he tomcatted around Penny. She was rarely impressed, per se, but she seemed to enjoy it. Sometimes she was even gracious, and one time she was especially gracious, and nine months later Ulyssa Penelope Victory McGill came into the world squawling.

Fast times, they were, and even with two salaries and a great deal of white whiskey changing hands, it was all Everett could do to get them a starter home and a ride to the courthouse. He bought the rings two days prior to the ceremony off a humorless Cherokee woman in Canton. They practically matched, and Everett had, by and large, thought about other things since.

He studied his own ring. The 6-karat finish had worn off between his fingers years ago, but if he kept them closed, it was still a perfectly adequate, brassy sort of affair.

He held it his mouth a lot in prison. It was only strange if it wasn't secret. He never did it before then, but it suddenly, one morning, became an instinct. It tasted like a coin, and it was safer than he was. He put it in his pocket when he slept, though, in case he managed to swallow it. There was a green patch just above his left nipple to remind him. He assumed it would fade. Like a bruise. Though it had occurred to him that it might be indelible.

But lots of guys get tattoos in prison. Everett couldn't watch–he'd always gotten faint at the thought of needles.

Not many people, as far as he knew, risked choking on their wedding ring, but he supposed they'd keep quiet about it if they did.

He guessed he'd miss his ring, too, if he _had_ swallowed it, or had it pinched off him, or lost it in the flood.

He wouldn't turn his nose up at his own loving, charming, long-suffering husband for _that_, though. No he wouldn't. If nothing else, there were certain itches he hadn't scratched in a long, long time. A long time…

"Well that's enough of that," he said aloud.

"We can't do this no more."

Delmar raised an eyebrow and turned his face to Pete for a full, long second, on the off-chance he might have something more to say this time. Pete wasn't looking at him, though, and he didn't say anything else. Delmar leaned onto his knees again, and ran his thumb around the bowl of his new pipe. It was a good one. Symmetrical.

"Figure Everett's got any tobaccer on the place?" he asked.

"Hmph," said Pete. With a fair deal of rustling he settled back into the bench, hands on his knees and chin on his chest. Over the course of the last hour, Pete's eyes had been steadily disappearing from view. Pete preferred to see the world through his eyebrows if it wasn't to his liking. Delmar knew this, and he hoped to God it meant that Pete was finally tired of sitting in the park. He'd been determined to let the man have his fun; after 13 years he deserved it. But Delmar had downed three pots of coffee that morning just to see what would happen. What happened was he could feel his heartbeat in his neck and the grass, on an individual level, had gotten more interesting. He had twelve or thirteen pipes now. He was out of corncobs.

"Delmar!" Delmar jumped. It was a fifth-or-sixth-try sort of address. Pete's eyes were open again, and darting between his. Delmar blinked.

"Yeah, Pete?"

"You hear what I said?"

"We cain't do this no more?"

"I said this is vagrancy. You sit around any one place long enough and you're a vagrant, and you can get the law on you fo' vagrancy."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, and we cain't affo'd no law on us now, not right now we been pardoned and turned right around and stoled a–" Pete lowered his voice. "Well, you know well as I what we stoled, it ain't impo'tant, what's impo'tant is you and me is tempting fate something awful and besides, there's ho'se flies out bad and we're liable to contract some sorta disease, if they don't eat us alive first. And we ain't got no money. And we ain't about to find none cooling our heels right here like a couple a' lumps on a log."

"That's true," said Delmar. Pete pulled Delmar up by the arm, and Delmar clamped his pipe–his best yet by far–between his teeth and smiled. "So what're we gonna do?"


	6. Chapter 6: Jimmy Brown, the Newsboy

"Table for one, sir?"

"Huh?"

"Table for one?"

"I weren't lookin' for no table."

"Well, I could seat you at the bar if you like."

"Naw. I mean I'm lookin' for work."

"Oh!"

"Yes ma'am." He fiddled with his hat. He wasn't sure it was polite to shake a lady's hand, but he sure felt like he should be doing _something_. "Name a' Pete." She looked nervous. That was a shame, but what did she expect him to do? Bow? Smile? Get down on one knee and propose?

"Well, sir, I–I reckon you wanna talk to the manager." Pete nodded intently. "Here, if you follow me, I'll bring you to 'im."

She looked over her shoulder a lot in the process. Enough for Pete to wonder if the was putting it on to be...pitiable, or embarrass him–or else trying to tell him something. He reminded himself that every woman he saw, or man, was not necessarily trying anything. Even if she should happen to look like she was. It had just been a long time since that fact had been of any use to him, and he never learned it too well in the first place.

"That there's his office on the right, mister," she said, and scurried off back to the dining room. Pete made sure his top button was done-up, pressed his lips shut, and knocked.

"Yeeeeeup?" came a voice.

"Sir? You got a minute? Please?"

"I suppose I does, son, I suppose I does. C'mon in."

It was a very small office, with one window high up on the wall, like in a cellar–though they weren't in the cellar. The manager was…

Pete's jaw slackened. Then he rolled his eyes as far back in his skull as they could go, straight up to the good Lord himself, because the manager was _blind. _Very, especially blind–his eyes were gone. When Pete thought about that he didn't like it one bit. But he had had good luck with the blind lately and he didn't want to look away.

"Well? How can I help ya? Your monkfish underdone?"

"My–? Naw, sir. No. My name's Pete, I come lookin' for a job."

"That so?" Pete nodded, then said,

"Yessir."

"Waal. You got any references?"

"Well...no. I was just lookin' fo'...casual labor. You know, lifting and carrying. I can cook real fine, too, but I ain't worked in a place like this befo' and I expect I'll have to work my way up."

"'Fraid we ain't got any openings on staff." Pete stepped closer to the desk. There was only room for him to take one.

"I might could get some. Some references," said Pete.

"If you was in the war, you'd have a reference," said the manager. "And if you wasn't, well, I'm sorry, you ain't something I kin afford to stretch re-sources for."

"It seem to me you either got a place or you don't," Pete mumbled.

"What's that, son?" It wasn't an I-didn't-catch-that, it was a dare-you-stand-by-that. It wasn't so much that Pete dared, just that some heat was starting to build in his gut, which always made him stupid.

"I says it seem to me, you either got a place or you don't."

"Properly speaking I don't. Times is tight. But I tries to find..._casual labor '_round the place for those as've labored for our freedom. You ever labored for anybody's freedom, son?"

"Well."

"Well?"

"I labored all right."

"Doin' what?"

"Well...crushin' gravel, mostly. Planting n' picking. I even worked on cars some. Ain't none a' that easier'n standin' o'er a stove."

"How'd you know?"

"I done it. You just thinks what'll taste good an' fry it."

"That so."

"I reckon that ain't it exactly, in a fine place like this here, but I got experience, is what I'm sayin'. Why I guess t'was… five, six year'n. Down in Picayune. Little place name a' Mama's Stewpot."

"This was when?"

"Uh…" Pete took a second to count. "1917, I'd say that was. '17 to '24 straight through."

"You know where I was at in 1917?"

"No."

"France. Cha-toe-terry." The manager grinned. "Left my eyes in no-man's land."

"An' right jealous I am, too," muttered Pete.

"What was that?"

"I weren't old enough to get in on the last war, I says. But it hardly seem much different'n hard labor, I mean, as far as buildin' muscle."

"It ain't about the muscle, boy, it's about–"

"References?"

"–character."

Pete didn't know what to say to that. He had never had much character. Not in the traditional sense.

"Well, I work hard. Don't ask no questions besides."

"That so?"

"Yessir."

"You honest?"

"How ya mean?"

"Are you honest, do you drink or steal or gamble?"

"I never gambled in my life," said Pete.

"Hm." The manager leaned back in his chair impassively.

"And I ain't lied to you, neither."

"Uh-huh. Well. It's just...a matter of references.

"I'll get you a reference, old man! I–why, I'll gitcha a reference from the _damn_…" Pete paused. "Governor," he said more evenly.

"Well, I suggest you march yourself on outta here and start lookin' for it, then, 'for I have you hescorted."

"The governor," mused Pete.

"You hear me?"

"Yeah, yeah," said Pete. "Forget your casual labor, mister. I _got _a job. I got a job already! Hear?" Pete banged on the desk. The manager jumped. Pete stared down at him another moment, then strode out through the dining room. He grinned at the waitress as he passed. She drew in on herself and looked away. Pete ignored it, or tried to.

"My. I plumb forgot about bein' a brain trust."

"It's okay, I near-'nuff did too. Don't think we start up with that 'til Pappy gets reelected, anyhow."

"When's that?"

"Don't know."

"Ma'am?" Delmar broke away to tail a woman as she strolled past. "Excuse me, ma'am?" Delmar put a hand on her shoulder. Pete hissed his name, but it was like calling a cat.

She didn't even jump. She turned and smiled politely. "Pardon us, ma'am, but you wouldn't know when the election is, huh?"

"Well, now…I believe it's the 5th. But I'd check the paper if I was you."

"Much obliged." He touched the brim of his hat as she went on, and turned to Pete. "Lady said it's the 5th–"

"I heard it. Shee_it_, Delmar." Delmar stopped smiling. "You cain't just grab hold a' ladies, you'll scare 'em."

"Why…"

"An' next day'll find you up in Parchman again, only this time for carnal indignity."

"I was just asking her a question is all."

"Yeah, but you cain't grab hold of her like that."

"I didn't _wrastle_ her or nothing, I only talked to 'er."

"She might not see it that way! Jesus."

"Well…" Delmar thought it over. "I guess I only seed it as I seed it." He opened his mouth to continue, but it hung open while he chose his words.

"What?"

"You know...women?"

"Yeah?"

"You know, they'se just folks, Pete. They'se purty an' all, but they'se just folks like you'n me."

"Shut up, Delmar."


End file.
